My life is REALLY over now: Part 23948732

Have you ever noticed how much people delight in telling you, “Your life is REALLY over now!” once you become a parent? Scratch that – it actually starts in pregnancy. Any happy news, any milestone or new skill, people are just foaming at the mouth to let you know how much your life is about to start sucking.

“I’m pregnant!”

“Your life is REALLY over now!”

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“I had my baby!”

“Your life is REALLY over now!”

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“My baby’s rolling over!”

“Your life is REALLY over now!”

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“My baby eats solid food!”

“Your life is REALLY over now!”

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“My baby’s crawling!”

“Your life is REALLY over now!”

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“My baby said her first word!”

“Your life is REALLY over now!”

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My daughter is now 13 months old and not quite walking yet, so of course I’ve been hearing this a lot: “Ohhh just WAIT until she’s walking. Then your life will REALLY be over!”

Why do people seem to revel so much in the misery of others? (And why does every milestone have to be a bad thing??)

This weekend, I did it to myself. My daughter’s crawling speed has suddenly reached NASCAR levels AND she has started declining her morning nap. These two things together mean that I am chasing her all over my house from 6:00 am to 1:00 pm on weekends now. Whoop-dee-doo. It’s hard to get anything done when my eyes have to be constantly on her, and it’s hard to cram a full day’s work into her two-hour nap. The point is, life is really exhausting right now, and I seem to be less productive at home than ever before. This weekend, I actually caught myself saying, “My life is REALLY over now!”

That blur in the background is my kid. That cup in the foreground is my fuel.

You know what, though – with kids, everything is a trade-off. Each milestone brings its own challenges and represents a progression in my own personal loss of freedom and convenience. But let’s not ignore that progress – as noisy and tiring as it may be – is a wonderful thing! It represents a greater level of independence and another step toward my child becoming a real, live, thinking, choosing, participating-in-the-world person. I didn’t have a child to have a baby doll (though that baby doll stage WAS cute and uncomplicated while it lasted).

So, shut your pie-hole, hater! You may be better rested than me, have a cleaner kitchen floor, have more time to catch up on your DVR, and be able to remember where you left your phone, but are you SURE you’re not just jealous that you don’t get to come home to THIS (see below) every day?

Yesss!!! There absolutely are some apps to help locate clean restrooms! Charmin toilet paper has one called SitorSquat. Then there’s a similar one called Whizzer. And if those don’t help, there’s always the Starbucks Store Locator app. I can personally vouch for their convenient and clean restrooms.

HAHA! I so remember that comment, and I may have even made it myself (your life is REALLY over when your baby is first potty-trained — life is organized around locating public toilets everywhere. Is there an app for that?). You have such a great writing style, Emily! And of course such a cute baby.